Richard Jefferies (continued 4)

It takes skill as well as mere strength even to do so simple a thing as to split the rough logs lying here on the ground. They are not like those Abraham Lincoln began life working at—even-grained wood, quickly divided—but tough and full of knots strangely twisted; so that it needs judgment to put the wedges in the right place.

Near the wood-pile is a well and a stone trough for thirsty horses to drink from, and as the water, carelessly pumped in by the carters’ lads, frequently overflows, the ground just there is usually moist. If one of the loose oak logs that lie here with the grass growing up round it is rolled over, occasionally a lizard may be found under it. This lizard is slender, and not more than three or four inches in length, general colour a yellowish green. Where one is found a second is commonly close by. They are elegantly shaped, and quick in their motions, speedily making off. They may now and then be discovered under large stones, if there is a crevice, in the meadows. They do not in the least resemble the ordinary ‘land-lizard,’ which is a much coarser-looking and larger creature, and is not an inhabitant of this locality: at all events it is rare enough to have escaped me here, though I have often observed it in districts where the soil is light and sandy and where there is a good deal of heath-land. The land-lizards will stroll indoors if the door be left open. These lesser but more elegant lizards appear to prefer a damp spot—cool and moist, but not positively wet.

A large shed built against the side of the adjacent stable is used as a carpenter’s workshop—much carpenter’s work is done on a farm—and here is a bench with a vice and variety of tools. When sawing, the wood operated on often ‘ties’ the saw, as it is called—that is, pinches it—which makes it hard to work; a thin wedge of wood is then inserted to open a way, and the blade of the saw rubbed with a little grease, which the metal, heated by the friction, melts into oil. This eases the work—a little grease, too, will make a gimlet bore quicker. Country carpenters keep this grease in a horn—a cow’s horn stopped at the larger end with a piece of wood and at the other by its own natural growth. Now the mice (which are everywhere on farm premises) are so outrageously fond of grease that they will spend any length of time gnaw-gnaw-gnawing till they do get at it. Right through the solid stopper of wood they eat their way, and even through the horn; so that the carpenter is puzzled to know how to preserve it out of their reach. It is of no use putting it on a shelf, because they either rush up the wall or drop from above. At last, however, he has hit upon a dodge.

He has suspended the horn high above the ground by a loop of copper wire, which projects six or eight inches from the wall, like a lamp on a bracket. The mice may get on the bench, and may run up the wall, but when they get to the wire they cannot walk out on it—like tight-rope walking—the more especially as the wire, being thin and flexible, bends and sways if they attempt it. This answers the purpose as a rule; but even here the carpenter declares that once now and then his horn is pilfered, and can only account for it by supposing that a bolder mouse than common makes a desperate leap for it, and succeeds in landing on the flat surface of the wooden stopper.

The shed has one small window only, which has no glass, but is secured by an iron bar (he needs no larger window, for all carpenters work with the door open); and through this window a robin has entered and built a nest in a quiet corner behind some timber. Though a man is at work here so often, hammering and sawing, the birds come fearlessly to their young, and pick up the crumbs he leaves from his luncheon.

Between the timber framework of the shed and the brickwork of the adjacent stable chinks have opened, and in these and in the chinks between the wooden lintel of the stable-door and the bricks above it the bats frequently hide, passing the day there. Others hide in the tiles of the roof where their nests are made. The labouring lads often amuse themselves searching for these creatures, whose one object in daylight seems to be to cling to something; they will hang to the coat with the claws at the extremity of their membranous wings, and if left alone will creep out of sight into the pocket. There are two well-marked species of bats here—one small and the other much larger.

The lesser bat flies nearer to the ground, and almost always follows the contour of some object or building. They hawk to and fro for hours in the evening under the eaves of the farmhouse, and frequently enter the great garrets and the still larger cheese-room (where the cheese is stored to mature)—sometimes through the windows, and sometimes seeming to creep through hales made by sparrows or starlings in the roof. Moths are probably the attraction; of these there are generally plenty in and about old houses. Occasionally a bat will come into the sitting-room, should the doors be left open on a warm summer evening: this the old folk think an evil omen, and still worse if in its alarm at the attempts made to drive it away it should chance to knock against the candle and overturn or put it out. They think, too, that a bat seen in daytime is a bad sign. Once now and then one gets disturbed by some means in the tiles, and flutters in a helpless manner to the nearest shelter; for in daylight they seem quite at a loss, though flying so swiftly at night.

The greater bat hawks at a considerable elevation above houses and trees, and wheels and turns with singular abruptness, so that some think it a test of a good shot to bring them down. The reason, however, why many find it difficult to hit a bat is because they are unaccustomed to shoot at night, and not because of its manner of flight for it often goes quite straight. It is also believed to be a test of good hearing to be able to hear the low shrill squeak of the bat uttered as it flies: the same is said of the shrew mouse, whose cry is yet more faint and acute. The swift, too, has a peculiar kind of screech, but easily heard.

Beyond the stables are the cattle-sheds and cow-yards. These sheds are open on the side towards the yard, supported there by a row of wooden pillars stepped on stones to keep them from rotting. On the large cross-beams within the swallows make their nests. When the eggs are hard set, the bird will sit so close that with care and a gentle manner of approach you may sometimes even stroke her back lightly with your finger without making her rise. They become so accustomed to men constantly in and out the sheds as to feel little alarm. Some build their nests higher up under the roof-tree.

To the adjoining rickyard redstarts come every summer, building their nests there; ‘horse-matchers’ or stonechats also in summer often visit the rickyard, though they do not build in it. Some elm trees shade the ricks, and once now and then a wood-pigeon settles in them for a little while. The coo of the dove may be heard frequently, but she does not build very near the house.

On this farm the rookery is at some distance in the meadows, and the rooks rarely come nearer than the field just outside the post and rails that enclose the rickyard, though they pass over constantly, flying low down without fear, unless some one chances just then to come out carrying a gun. Then they seem seized with an uncontrollable panic, and stop short in their career by a violent effort of the wings, to wheel off immediately at a tangent. Perhaps no other bird shows such evident signs of recognising a gun. Chaffinches, it must not be forgotten, frequent the rickyard in numbers.

Finally come the rats. Though trapped, shot, and ferreted without mercy, the rats insist on a share of the good things going. They especially haunt the pigsties, and when the pigs are served with their food feed with them at the same trough. Those old rats that come to the farmstead are cunning fierce beasts, not to be destroyed without much difficulty. They will not step on a trap, though never so cleverly laid; they will face a ferret, unless he happens to be particularly large and determined, and bite viciously at dogs. But with all their cunning there is one simple trick which they are not up to: this is to post yourself high up above the ground, when they will not suspect your presence; a ladder is placed against a tree within easy shot of the pigsty, and the gunner, have previously arranged that everything shall be kept quiet, takes his stand on it, and from thence kills a couple perhaps at once.

On looking back, it appears that the farmhouse, garden, orchard, and rickyard at Wick are constantly visited by about thirty-five wild creatures, and, in addition, five others come now and then, making a total of forty. Of these forty, twenty-six are birds, two bats, eight quadrupeds, and four reptiles. This does not include some few additional birds that only come at long intervals, nor those that simply fly overhead or are heard singing at a distance.

The great meadow hedge—the highway of the birds—where it approaches the ha-ha wall of the orchard, is lovely in June with the wild roses blooming on the briars which there grow in profusion. Some of these briars stretch forth into the meadow, and then, bent down by their own weight, form an arch crowned with flowers. There is an old superstition about these arches of briar hung out along the hedgerow: magical cures of whooping-cough and some other diseases of childhood can, it is believed, be effected by passing the child at sunrise under the briar facing the rising sun.

This had to be performed by the ‘wise woman.’ There was one in every hamlet but a few years ago—and indeed here and there an aged woman retains something like a reputation for witchcraft still. The ‘wise woman’ conducted the child entrusted to her care at the dawn to the hedge, where she knew there was a briar growing in such a position that a person could creep under it facing the east, and there, as the sun rose, passed the child through.

In the hollow just beneath the ha-ha wall, where it is moist, grow tall rushes; and here the great dragon-fly darts to and fro so swiftly as to leave the impression of a line of green drawn suddenly through the air. Though travelling at such speed, he has the power of stopping abruptly, and instantly afterwards returns upon his path. These handsome insects are often placed on mirrors as an ornament in farmhouses. The labourers will have it that they sting like the hornet; but this they say also of many other harmless creatures, seeming to have a general distrust of the insect kind. They will tell you alarming stories of terrible sufferings—arms swollen to double the natural size, necks inflamed, and so forth—caused by the bites of unknown flies. Not being able to discover what fly it is that inflicts these poisonous wounds, and having spent so many hours in the fields without experiencing such effects, I rather doubt these statements, though put forth in perfect good faith: indeed, I have often seen the arms and chests of the men in harvest time with huge bumps rising on them which they declared were thus caused. The common harvest bug, which gets under the skin, certainly does not cause such great swellings as I have seen; nor the stoat-fly, which latter is the most bloodthirsty wretch imaginable.

With a low hissing buzz, a long, narrow, and brownish grey insect settles on your hand as you walk among the hay, and presently you feel a tingling sensation, and may watch (if you have the patience to endure the irritation) its body gradually dilate and grow darker in colour as it absorbs the blood. When once thoroughly engaged, nothing will frighten this fly away: you may crush him, but he will not move from fear: he will remain till, replete with blood, he falls off helpless into the grass.

The horses in the waggons have at this season to be watched by a boy armed with a spray of ash, with which he flicks off the stoats that would otherwise drive the animals frantic. A green spray is a great protection against flies; if you carry a bough in your hand as you walk among the meadows they will not annoy you half so much. Such a bough is very necessary when lying perdu in a dry ditch in summer to shoot a young rabbit, and when it is essential to keep quiet and still. Without it it is difficult to avoid lifting the hand to knock the flies away—which motion is sure to alarm the rabbit that may at that very moment be peeping out preparatory to issuing from his hole. It is impossible not to pity the horses in the hayfields on a sultry day; despite all the care taken, their nostrils are literally black with crowds of flies, which constantly endeavour to crawl over the eyeball. Sunshine itself does not appear so potent in bringing, forth insects as the close electrical kind or heat that precedes a thunderstorm. This is so well known that when the flies are more than usually busy the farmer makes haste to get in his hay, and lets down the canvas over his rick. The cows give warning at the same time by scampering about in the wildest and most ludicrous manner—their tails held up in the air—tormented by insects.

The ha-ha wall, built of loose stones, is the home of thousands upon thousands of ants, whose nests are everywhere here, the ground being undisturbed by passing footsteps. They ascend trees to a great height, and may be seen going up the trunk sometimes in a continuous stream, one behind the other in Indian file.

In one spot on the edge of the ha-ha is a row of beehives—the garden wall and a shrubbery shelter them here from the north and east, and the drop of the ha-ha gives them a clear exit and entrance. This is thought a great advantage—not to have any hedge or bush in front of the hives—because the bees, heavily laden with honey or pollen, encounter no obstruction in coming home. They are believed to work more energetically when this is the case, and they certainly do seem to exhibit signs of annoyance, as if out of temper, if they get entangled in a bush. Indeed, if you chance to be pursued by an angry cloud of bees whose ire you have aroused, the only safe place is a hedge or bush, into which make haste to thrust yourself, when the boughs and leaves will baffle them. If the hive be moved to a different place, the bees that chance at the time to be out in the fields collecting honey, upon their return, finding their home gone, are evidently at a loss. They fly round, hovering about over the spot for a long time before they discover the fresh position of the hive.

The great hornet, with its tinge of reddish orange, comes through the garden sometimes with a heavy buzz, distinguishable in a moment from the sound of any other insect. All country folk believe the hornet’s sting to be the most poisonous and painful of any, and will relate instances of persons losing the use of their arms for a few days in consequence of the violent inflammation. Sometimes the hornet selects for its nest an aperture in an old shed near the farmhouse. I have seen their nests quite close to houses; but, unless wantonly disturbed, there is not the slightest danger from them, or indeed from any other insects of this class. I think the common hive-bees are the worst tempered of any—they resent the slightest interference with their motions. The hornet often chooses an old hollow withy-pollard for the site of its nest.

In the orchard there is at least one nest of the humble-bee, made at a great depth in a deserted mouse’s hole. These bees have eaten away and removed the grass just round the entrance, so as to get a clear road in and out. They are as industrious as the hive-bee; but, as there are not nearly so many working together in one colony, they do not store up anything approaching to the same quantity of honey. There is a superstition that if a humble-bee buzzes in at the window of the sitting-room it is a sure sign of a coming visitor.

Be careful how you pick up a ripe apple, all glowing orange, from the grass in the orchard; roll it over with your foot first, or you may chance to find that you have got a handful of wasps. They eat away the interior of the fruit, leaving little but the rind; and this very hollowness causes the rind to assume richer tints and a more tempting appearance. Specked apples on the tree, whether pecked by a blackbird, eaten by wasps or ants, always ripen fastest, and if you do not mind cutting out that portion, are the best. Such a fallen apple, when hollowed out within, is a veritable torpedo if incautiously handled.

Wasps are incurable drunkards. If they find something sweet and tempting they stick to it, and swill till they fall senseless to the ground. They are then most dangerous, because unseen and unheard, and one may put one’s hand on them in ignorance of their whereabouts. Noticing once that a particular pear tree appeared to attract wasps, though there was little or no fruit on it, I watched their motions, and found they settled at the mouth of certain circular apertures that had been made in the trunk. There the sap was slowly exuding, and to this sap the wasps came and sipped it till they could sip no more. The tree being old and of small value, it was determined to see what caused these circular holes. They were cut out with a gouge, when the whole interior of the trunk was found bored with winding tunnels, through which a pistol bullet might have been passed. This had been done by an enormous grub, as long and large as one’s finger.

Old-world plants and flowers linger still like heirlooms in the farmhouse garden, though their pleasant odour is ofttimes choked by the gaseous fumes from the furnaces of the steam-ploughing engines as they pass along the road to their labour. Then a dark vapour rises above the tops of the green elms, and the old walls tremble and the earth itself quakes beneath the pressure of the iron giant, while the atmosphere is tainted with the smell of cotton-waste and oil. How little these accord with the quiet, sunny slumber of the homestead. But the breeze comes, and ere the rattle of the wheels and cogs has died away, the fragrance of the flowers and green things has reasserted itself. Such a sunny slumber, and such a fragrance of flowers, both wild and cultivated, have dwelt round and over the place these 200 years, and mayhap before that. It is perhaps a fancy only, yet I think that where men and nature have dwelt side by side time out of mind there is a sense of a presence, a genius of the spot, a haunting sweetness and loveliness not elsewhere to be found. The most lavish expenditure, even when guided by true taste, cannot produce this feeling about a modern dwelling.

At Wick, by the side of the garden path, grows a perfect little hedge of lavender; every drawer in the house, when opened, emits an odour of its dried flowers. Here, too, are sweet marjoram, rosemary, and rue; so also bay and thyme, and some pot-herbs whose use is forgotten, besides southernwood and wormwood. They do not make medical potions at home here now, but the lily-leaves are used to allay inflammation of the skin. The house-leek had a reputation with the cottage herbalists; it is still talked of, but I think very rarely used.

Among the flowers here are beautiful dark-petalled wallflowers, sweet-williams, sweet-briar, and pansies. In spring the yellow crocus lifts its head from among the grass of the green in front of the house (as the snowdrops did also), and here and there a daffodil. These, I think, never look so lovely as when rising from the green sward; the daffodils grow, too, in the orchard. Woodbine is everywhere—climbing over the garden seat under the sycamore tree, whose leaves are spotted sometimes with tiny reddish dots, the honey-dew.

Just outside the rickyard, where the grass of the meadow has not been mown but fed by cattle, grow the tall buttercups, rising to the knee. The children use the long hollow stems as tubes wherewith to suck up the warm new milk through its crown of thick froth, from the oaken milking-pail. There is a fable that the buttercups make the butter yellow when they come—but the cows never eat them, being so bitter; they eat all round close up to the very stems, but leave them standing scrupulously. The children, top, make similar pipes of straw to suck up the new cider fresh from the cider-mill, as it stands in the tubs directly after the grinding. Under the shady trees of the orchard the hare’s parsley flourishes, and immediately without the orchard edge, on the ‘shore’ of the ditch, grow thick bunches of the beautiful blue crane’s-bill, or wild geranium, which ought to be a garden flower and not left to the chance mercy of the scythe. There, too, the herb Robert hides, and its foliage, turning colour, lies like crimson lace on the bank.

Even the tall thistles of the ditch have their beauty—the flower has a delicate tint, varying with the species from mauve to purple; the humble-bee visits every thistle-bloom in his path, and there must therefore be sweetness in it. Then in the autumn issues forth the floating thistledown, streaming through the air and rolling like an aerial ball over the tips of the bennets. Thistledown is sometimes gathered to fill pillow-cases, and a pillow so filled is exquisitely soft. There is not a nook or corner of the old place where something interesting may not be found. Even the slates on a modern addition to the homestead are each bordered with yellow lichen—perhaps because they adjoin thatch, for slates do not seem generally to encourage the growth of lichen. It appears to prefer tiles, which therefore sooner assume an antique tint.

To the geraniums in the bow-window the humming-bird moth comes now and then, hovering over the scarlet petals. Out of the high elms drops a huge grey moth, so exactly the colour of grey lichen that it might be passed for it—pursued, of course, as it clumsily falls, by two or more birds eager for the spoil. It is feast-time with them when the cockchafers come: they leave nothing but wing-cases scattered on the garden paths, like the shields of slain men-at-arms.

In the bright sunshine, when there is not a cloud in the sky, slender beetles come forth from the cracks of the earth and run swiftly across the paths, glittering green and gold, iridescent colours glistening on their backs. These are locally called sunbeetles, because they appear when the sun is brightest. Be careful not to step on or kill one; for if you do it will certainly rain, according to the old superstition. The blackbird, when he picks up one of the larger beetles, holds it with its back towards him in his bill, so that the legs claw helplessly at the air, and thus carries it to a spot where he can pick it to pieces at his leisure.

The ha-ha wall of the orchard is the favourite haunt of butterflies; they seem to love its sunny aspect, and often cling to the loose stones like ornaments attached by some cunning artist. Sulphur butterflies hover here early in the spring, and later on white and brown and tiny blue butterflies pass this way, calling en route. Sometimes a great noble of the butterfly world comes in all the glory of his wide velvety wings, and deigns to pause awhile that his beauty may be seen.

Somewhere within doors, in the huge beams or woodwork, the death-tick is sure to be heard in the silence of the night: even now the old folk listen with a lingering dread. Give the woodwork a smart tap, and the insect stops a few moments, but it rapidly gets accustomed to such taps, and after a few ceases to take notice of them. This manner of building houses with great beams visibly supporting the ceiling, passing across the roam underneath it, had one advantage. On a rainy day the children could go into the garrets or the cheese-loft and there form a swing, attaching the ropes to the hooks in the beam across the ceiling.

The brewhouse, humble though its object may be, is not without its claim to admiration. It is open from the floor to the rafters of the roof, and that roof in its pitch, the craft of the woodwork, the dull polish of the old oak, has an interest far surpassing the dead staring level of flat lath and plaster. Noble workmanship in wood may be found, too, in some of the ancient barns; sometimes the beams are of black oak, in others of chestnut.

In these modern days men have lost the pleasures of the orchard; yet an old-fashioned orchard is the most delicious of places wherein to idle away the afternoon of a hazy autumn day, when the sun seems to shine with a soft slumberous warmth without glare, as if the rays came through an aerial spider’s web spun across the sky, letting all the beauty, but not the heat, slip through its invisible meshes. There is a shadowy coolness in the recesses under the trees. On the damson trunks are yellowish crystalline knobs of gum which has exuded from the bark. Now and then a leaf rustles to the ground, and at longer intervals an apple falls with a decided thump. It is silent save for the gentle twittering of the swallows on the topmost branches—they are talking of their coming journey—and perhaps occasionally the distant echo of a shot where the lead has gone whistling among a covey. It is a place to dream in, bringing with you a chair to sit on—for it will be freer from insects than the garden seat—and a book. Put away all thought of time: often in striving to get the most value from our time it slips from us as the reality did from the dog that greedily grasped at the shadow: simply dream of what you will, with apples and plums, nuts and filberts within reach.

Dusky Blenheim oranges, with a gleam of gold under the rind; a warmer tint of yellow on the pippins. Here streaks of red, here a tawny hue. Yonder a load of great russets; near by heavy pears bending the strong branches; round black damsons; luscious egg-plums hanging their yellow ovals overhead; bullace, not yet ripe, but presently sweetly piquant. On the walnut trees bunches of round green balls—note those that show a dark spot or streak, and gently tap them with the tip of the tall slender pole placed there for the purpose. Down they come glancing from bough to bough, and, striking the hard turf, the thick green rind splits asunder, and the walnut itself rebounds upwards. Those who buy walnuts have no idea of the fine taste of the fruit thus gathered direct from the tree, when the kernel, though so curiously convoluted, slips its pale yellow skin easily and is so wondrously white. Surely it is an error to banish the orchard and the fruit garden from the pleasure-grounds of modern houses, strictly relegating them to the rear, as if something to be ashamed of.

Chapter Eleven.

The Home-Field—Hazel Corner—The Divining-Rod—Rabbits’ Holes—The Corncrake—Ventriloquism of Birds—Hedge Fruit.

A wicket-gate affords a private entrance from the orchard into the home-field, opening on the meadow close to the great hedge, the favourite highway of the birds. Tracing this hedge away from the homestead, in somewhat more than two hundred yards it is joined by another hedge crossing the top of the field, thus forming a sheltered nook or angle, which has been alluded to as the haunt of squirrels. Here the highway hedge is almost all of hazel, though one large hawthorn tree stands on the ‘shore’ of the ditch. Hazel grows tall, straight, and is not so bushy as some underwood; the lesser boughs do not interlace or make convenient platforms on which to build nests, and birds do not use it much.

The ancient divination by the hazel wand, or, rather, the method of searching for subterranean springs, is not yet forgotten; some of the old folk believe in it still. I have seen it tried myself, half in joke, half in earnest. A slender rod is cut, and so trimmed as to have a small fork at one end; this fork is placed under the little finger in such a way that the rod itself comes over the back of the other fingers; it is then lightly balanced, and vibrates easily. The magician walks slowly over the ground selected, watching the tip of the wand; and should it bend downwards without volition on his part, it is a sign that water is concealed beneath the spot.

The nuts upon the bushes do not all ripen at the same time: one or two bushes are first, and offer ripe nuts before the rest have hardened sufficiently. The leaves on these also drop earlier, turning a light yellow. The size and even the shape of the nuts vary too, some being nearly round and others roughly resembling the almond. Their flavour when taken from the bush is sweet, juicy, ‘nutty.’ When they will ‘slip udd’ is the proper time to gather them—i.e. when the hood or outer green covering slips off at a touch, leaving the light-brown nut in the palm: it is a delicately shaded brown. Cut off just the tip of the nut—the pointed keystone of its Gothic arch—with a penknife; insert the blade ever so slightly, and a gentle turn splits the shell and shows two onyx-white hemispheres of kernel.

With a little care the tallest boughs may be pulled down uninjured; if dragged down rudely the bough will be ‘sprung’ where it joins the stole below, and will then wither and die. The plan is simply to apply force by degrees, pulling the main bough only so far forward as to enable the hand to reach air upper branch, seizing the upper branch, and by its aid reaching a still higher one, and gradually bending the central stem till it forms a bow. If done gradually and the bow not too acute, the tallest bush will spring up when released without the least injury. With a crook to seize the bush as high up as possible—where it bends more easily—not a twig need be broken, and nutting may be enjoyed without doing the least damage.

Under a tall ash tree rising out of the hazel bushes, and near the great hawthorn on the edge or shore of the ditch, the grass grows rank and is of the deepest green. The dove that could be heard cooing from the orchard built her nest in the hawthorn, which, where it overhangs the grass like a canopy, is bare of boughs for six or seven feet up the gnarled stem. The cattle, who love to shelter under it from the heat of the sun, browsed on the young shoots, so that no branch could form; but on the side towards the ditch there are immense spiny thorns, long enough and strong enough to make a savage’s arrow-head or awl. The doves do not seem nearly so numerous as the wood-pigeons (doves too, in strict language); they are much smaller, rather duller in colour—that is, when flying past—and are rarely seen more than two together. When the summer thunder is booming yonder over the hills, and the thin edge of the dark cloud showers its sweet refreshing rain, with the sunshine gleaming through on the hedge and grass here, between the rolling echoes the dove may be heard in the bush coo-cooing still more softly and lovingly to her mate.

Just in the very angle formed by the meeting hedges the ditch becomes almost a fosse, so broad and deep; the sandy banks have slipped, and the rabbits have excavated more, and over all the brambles have arched thickly with a background of brake fern. The flower of the bramble is very beautiful—a delicate pink bloom, succeeded by green berries, to ripen red, and later black, under the sun. A larger kind are found here and there—the children call them dew-berries or jew-berries indifferently. Some of the bramble leaves linger on a dull green all through the winter.

In the angle a narrow opening runs through between the two banks, which do not quite meet: it is so overgrown with bramble and fern, convolvulus and thorn, that unless the bushes were parted to look in no one would suspect the existence of this green tunnel, which on the other side opens on the ash copse, where a shallow furrow (dry) joins it. This tunnel is the favourite way and passage of the rabbits from the copse out into the tempting pasturage of the meadow; through it too, now and then, a fox creeps quietly. Rabbit-holes drill the bank everywhere, but one near this green bye-way is noticeable because of its immense size.

It must measure eighteen inches or nearly in diameter at the mouth; nor does it diminish abruptly, but continues almost as large a yard or more inside the bank. Spaniels will get right into such a ‘bury,’ till nothing but the tail can be seen, and, if permitted, stay there and dig and scratch frantically. They would sometimes, perhaps, succeed in reaching the prey were it not for the roots of thorn bushes or trees which cross the holes here and there like bars; these they cannot scratch through, but will bite and tear with their teeth—coming out now and then to breathe and shake the sand from their muzzles, then back again with a whine of eager excitement, till presently, in sheer exhaustion, they lie down at the mouth of the cave and pant. This is not allowed if it is known; but spaniels now and then steal away privately, and so frequently make for a hole like this that when their absence is discovered it is the first place visited in search of them. The mingled patience and excitement, the vast labour they will undergo, the quantity of sand they will throw out, the whine—it is not a bark—expressing intense desire, prove how deep is the hunting instinct in the dog.

Even if the burrows be ferreted, in a few weeks this great hole shows signs of fresh inhabitants; and such a specially enlarged entrance may be found somewhere in most of the banks frequented by rabbits. Why do they make an aperture so many times larger than they can possibly require? It may be a kind of ancestral hall, the favourite cave of the first settlers here, clung to by their descendants. Within, perhaps three, or even more, tunnels branch off from it. So busy are they, and so occupied when excavating a fresh passage, that sometimes when waiting quietly on a bank you may see the miner at work. The sand pours out as he casts it behind him with his hinder paws; his back is turned, so that he does not notice anyone.

Along the banks evidence maybe found of attempts at boring holes, abandoned after a few inches of progress had been made: sometimes a root, or a stone perhaps, interferes; sometimes, and apparently more often, caprice seems the only cause why the tunnel was discontinued. The grass in this corner is sweeter to their taste than elsewhere: their runs are everywhere—crossing and winding about.

In the evening, as the shadows deepen and a hush falls upon the meads, they come out and chase and romp with each other. When a couple are at play one will rush ten or a dozen yards away and begin to nibble as if totally unconscious of the other. The second meanwhile nibbles too, but all the while stealthily moves forward, not direct, but sideways, towards the first, demurely feeding. Suddenly the second makes a spring; the first, who has been watching out of the corners of his eye all the time, is off like the wind. Or sometimes he will turn and face the other, and jump clean over, a foot high. Sometimes both leap up together in the exuberance of their mirth.

By the trunk of a mighty oak, growing out of the hedge that runs along the top of the field, the brambles and underwood are thinner, as is generally the case close under a tree; and it is easy to push through just there. On the other side, a huge root covered with deep green moss affords a pleasant seat, leaning back against the trunk. Upon the right, close by, is the ash copse, with its border of thick fir trees; on the left oaks at intervals stand along the hedge; in front stretches the undulating surface of an immense pasture field called The Warren. Like a prairie it rolls gently away, dotted with hawthorn bushes, here and there a crab tree, and two rows of noble elms, in both of which the rooks are busy in spring. Beyond, the ground rises, and the small upland meadows are so thickly timbered as to look like distant glades of a forest; still farther are the downs.

Under this great oak in the stillness is a place to dream—in summer, looking upward into the vast expanse of green boughs, is an intricate architecture, an inimitable roof, whose lattice-windows are set with translucent lapis lazuli, for the deep blue of the sky seems to come down and rest upon it. The acorns are already there, as yet all cup, and little of the acorn proper showing; there is a tiny black speck on the top, and the young acorn faintly resembles some of the ancient cups with covers, the black speck being the knob by which the cover is lifted. After the first frosts, when the acorns are browned and come out of their cups from their own weight as they fall and strike the ground, the lads select the darkest or ripest, and eat one now and then; they half-roast them, too, like chestnuts.

In the early spring, when the night is bright and clear, it is a place to stand a moment and muse awhile. For the copse is dark and gloomy, the bare oaks are dark behind; the eye cannot see across the prairie, whose breadth is doubled by the night. But yonder lies a great grey sarsen boulder, like an uncouth beast of ancient days crouching in the hollow. Hush! there was a slight rustling in the grass there, as of a frightened thing; it was a startled hare hastening away. The brightest constellations of our latitude pour down their rays and influence on the birth of bud and leaf in spring; and at no other season is the sky so gorgeous with stars.

The grass in the meadow or home-field as it begins to grow tall in spring is soon visited by the corncrakes, who take up their residence there. In this district (though called the corncrake) these birds seem to frequent the mowing grass more than the arable fields, and they generally arrive about the time when it has grown sufficiently high and thick to hide their motions. This desire of concealment—to be out of sight—is apparently more strongly marked in them than in any other bird; yet they utter their loud call of ‘Crake, crake, crake!’ not unlike the turning of a wooden rattle, continuously though only at a short distance.

It is difficult to tell from what place the cry proceeds: at one moment it sounds almost close at hand, the next fifty yards off; then, after a brief silence, a long way to one side or the other. The attempt to mark the spot is in vain; you think you have it, and rush there, but nothing is to be seen, and a minute afterwards ‘Crake, crake!’ comes behind you. For the first two or three such attempts the crake seems to move but a little way, dodging to and fro in a zigzag, so that his call is never very far off; but if repeated again and again he gets alarmed, there is a silence, and presently you hear him in a corner of the mead a hundred yards distant. Perhaps once, if you steal up very, very quietly, and suddenly dart forward, or if you have been waiting till he has come unawares close to you, you may possibly see the grass move as if something passed through it; but in a moment he is gone, without a glimpse of his body having been seen. His speed must be very great to slip like this from one side of the field to the other in so few seconds.

The fact that the call apparently issues from the grass in one place, and yet upon reaching it the bird is not to be found, has given rise to the belief that the crake is a ventriloquist. It may be so; but even without special powers of that kind, ventriloquial effects would, I think, be produced by the peculiar habits of the bird. When that which causes a sound is out of sight it must always be difficult to fix upon the exact spot whence the sound comes. When the sound is made now here, now yonder, as the bird travels swiftly—still out of sight—it must be still more difficult. The crake doubtless often cries from a furrow, which would act something like a trough, tending to draw the sound along it. Finally the incessant repetition of the same note, harsh and loud, confuses the ear.

Some say in like manner that the starling ventriloquises. He has, indeed, one peculiar long-drawn hollow whistle which goes echoing round the chimneypots and to and fro among the gables; but it never deceives you as to his position on the roof unless you are indoors and cannot see him. It is the same with the finches in the trees, when the foliage is thick. Their notes seem to come from this side among the branches, but on peering carefully up there is no bird visible; then it sounds higher up, and even in the next tree; all the while the finch is but just overhead, and the moment he moves he is seen. Other birds equally deceive the ear: the yellowhammer does sometimes, and the chattering brook-sparrow; so will the blackbird when singing—always provided that they are temporarily invisible.

When the crake remains a long time in one place, uttering the call continuously, the illusion disappears, and there is no more difficulty in approximately fixing its position than that of any other bird. One summer a crake chose a spot on the ‘shore’ of the ditch of the highway hedge, not forty yards from the orchard ha-ha. There was a thick growth of tall grass, clogweed, and other plants just there, and some of the bushes pushed out over the sward. The nest was placed close to the ditch (not in it), and the noise the crakes made was something astonishing. ‘Crake, crake; crake!’ resounded the moment it was light—and it is light early at that season: ‘Crake, crake, crake!’ all the morning; the sound now and then, if the bird moved a few yards nearer, echoing back from some of the buildings. There was, or seemed to be, a slight cessation in the middle of the day, but towards evening it recommenced, and continued without cessation till quite dark. This lasted for some weeks: it chanced that the meadow was mown late, so that the birds were undisturbed. Why so apparently timid a bird should choose a spot near a dwelling is not easy to understand.

The crakes, however, when thus localised deceived no one by their supposed ventriloquial powers; therefore it seems clear that the deception is caused by their rapid changes of position. The mouse in like manner often gives an impression that it must be in one spot when it is really a yard away, the shrill squeak, as it were, left behind it. It is not easy sometimes to fix the position of the death-tick in woodwork. The home-field or meadow here is a favourite haunt of the crakes, for like all other birds they have their special places of resort. Another meadow, at some distance on the same farm, is equally favoured by them. This meadow adjoins that second line of bird-travel, following a brook previously alluded to. But as the crakes, though they will take refuge in a hedge, do not travel along it habitually, this circumstance may be accidental. Crakes, notwithstanding they run so swiftly, do not seem to move far when once they have arrived; they appear to restrict themselves to the field they have chosen, or, at the furthest, make an excursion into the next and return again, so that you may always know where to go to hear one.

The mowers cutting these meadows find the eggs—the nest being on the ground—and bring them to the farmstead, both as a curiosity and to be eaten, some thinking them equal to plover’s eggs. Though you may follow the sound ‘Crake, crake!’ in the grass for hours at a time, and sometimes get so near as to throw your walking-stick at a bunch of grass, you will never see the bird; and nothing, neither stick nor stone, will make it rise. Yet it is easy to shoot, as I found, in one particular way. The trick is to drive it into a hedge. Two persons and a spaniel well in hand walk towards the ‘Crake, crake!’ keeping some distance apart. The bird at first runs straight away; then, finding himself still pursued, tries to dodge back, but finds the line extended. He then takes refuge in silence, and endeavours to slip past unseen and unheard; but the spaniel’s power of scent baffles that. At last he makes for the hedge, when one person immediately goes on the other side, and the spaniel beats up it. The bird is now surrounded and cannot escape, and, as the dog comes close upon him, is compelled to rise and fly. As he rises his flight at first somewhat resembles the partridge’s, but it is slower and heavier, and he can be shot with the greatest ease. But if not fired at, after he has got well on the wing the flight becomes much stronger, and it is evident that he is capable of a long voyage.

Sometimes, by patience and skilfully anticipating his zigzag motions in the grass, the crake may be driven to the hedge without a dog. He will then, after a short time, if still hunted, ‘quat’ in the thickest bunch of grass or weeds he can find in the ditch, and will stay till all but stepped on, when he can be knocked down with a walking-stick. After the grass is mown, the crakes leave the meadows and go to the arable fields, where the crops afford them shelter. This district seems a very favourite resort of these birds.

The mowing grass while standing does not appear to attract other birds much; but immediately the scythe has passed over they flock to the swathes from the hedges, and come, too, to the hay itself when quite dry. In hay there are many plants whose stems are hollow. Now, as soon as a stalk is dry, if there be any crevice at all, insects will creep in; so that these tiny tubes are frequently full of inhabitants, which probably attract the birds.

Sometimes a bird will perch for a moment on a haymaker’s hat as he walks slowly down a lane with hedges each side; the fibres of hay have adhered to it, and the keen eyes above have detected some moving creature on them. Birds that are otherwise timid will remain on the footpath to the very last moment, almost till within reach, if they chance to be dissecting a choice morsel, some exquisite beetle or moth—pecking at it in eager haste and running what to them must seem a terrible risk for the sake of gratifying their taste.

The wood-pigeons are fond of acorns, and come for them to the oaks growing in an irregular row along the hedge at the top of the home-field. They are most voracious birds and literally cram their crops with this hard fruit. Squirrels and mice enjoy the nuts in Hazel Corner, and the thrushes and pigeons feed on the peggles which cover the great hawthorn bush there so thickly as to give it a reddish tint. There is a difference even in this fruit: on some bushes the peggles consist mainly of the internal stone, the edible coating being of the thinnest. On others the stone is embedded in, a thick mellow covering affording twice as much food. Like other products of the hedge, they are supposed to be improved by frost.

Farther down the highway hedge, by the gateway, a large elder bush, or rather tree, bears a profusion of berries. Blue-black sloes adhere to—they do not hang on—the blackthorn bushes: in places the boughs are loaded with them. Here and there crabs cling to the tough crab tree, whose bark has a dull gloss on it something like dark polished leather. Bunches of red berries shine on the woodbine: fruit growing in bunches usually depends, but these are often on the upper side of the stalk; and the latter bloom shows by them—flower and fruit at the same time. The berry has a viscous feel.

Larger berries—some red, some green, on the same bunch—cluster on the vines of the bryony. The white bryony, whose leaf is not unlike that of the grape, has a magical reputation, and the cottage folk believe its root to be a powerful ingredient in love potions, and also poisonous. They identify it with the mandrake. If growing in or close to a churchyard its virtues are increased, for, though becoming fainter as they lengthen, the shadows of the old superstitions linger still. Red nightshade berries—not the deadly nightshade, but the ‘bitter-sweet’—hang sullenly among the bushes where this creeping plant has trailed over them. Here and there upon the bank wild gooseberry and currant bushes may be found, planted by birds carrying off ripe fruit from the garden. A wild gooseberry may sometimes be seen growing out of the decayed ‘touchwood’ on the top of a hollow withy-pollard. Wild apple trees, too, are not uncommon in the hedges.

The beautiful rich colour of the horse-chestnut, when quite ripe and fresh from its prickly green shell, can hardly be surpassed; underneath the tree the grass is strewn with the shells, where they have fallen and burst. Close to the trunk the grass is worn away by the restless trampling of horses, who love the shade its foliage gives in summer. The oak-apples which appear on the oaks in spring—generally near the trunk—fall off in the summer, and lie shrivelled on the ground not unlike rotten cork, or black as if burned. But the oak-galls show thick on some of the trees, light green, and round as a ball; they will remain on the branches after the leaves have fallen, turning brown and hard, and hanging there till the spring comes again.

One of the cottagers in the adjacent hamlet collects these brown balls and strings them upon wire, making flower-stands and ornamental baskets for sale. They seem to appear in numbers upon those oak bushes rather than trees which spring up when an oak has been cut down but the stump has not been grubbed up. These shoots at first often bear leaves of great size, many times larger than the ordinary oak leaf; some are really immense, measuring occasionally fourteen or fifteen inches in length. As the shoots grow into a bush the leaves diminish in size and become like those of the tree.

In the ditch the tall teazle lifts its prickly head. The large leaves of this plant grow in pairs, one on each side of the stem, and while the plant is young are connected in a curious manner by a green membrane, or continuation of the lower part of the leaf round the stem, so as to form a cup. The stalk rises in the centre of the cup, and of these vessels there are three or four above each other in storeys. When it rains, the drops, instead of falling off as from other leaves, run down these and are collected in the cups, which thus form so many natural rain-gauges. If it is a large plant, the cup nearest the ground—the biggest—will hold as much as two or three wine-glasses. This water remains there for a considerable time, for several days after a shower, and is fatal to numbers of insects which climb up the stalk or alight on the leaves and fall in. While the grass and the earth of the bank are quite dry, therefore, the teazle often has a supply of water; and when it dries up, the drowned insects remain at the bottom like the dregs of a draught the plant has drained. Round the prickly dome-shaped head, as the summer advances, two circles of violet-hued flowers push out from cells defended by the spines, so that, seen protruding above the hedge, it resembles a tiara—a green circle at the bottom of the dome, and two circles of gems above.

Some of the grasses growing by the hedge are not to be handled carelessly, the edge of the long blade cutting like a lancet: the awn-like seeds of others, if they should chance to get into the mouth, as happens occasionally to the haymakers, work down towards the throat, the attempt to get rid of them causing a creeping motion the opposite way. This is owing to the awns all slanting in one direction.

On the sultry afternoons of the latter part of the summer the hedge is all but silent. Waiting in the gateway there is no sound for half an hour at a time, no call or merry song in the branches, nothing but the buzz of flies. The birds are quiet, or nearly so: they slip about so noiselessly that it is difficult to observe them, so that many perhaps migrate before it is suspected, and others stay on when thought to be gone. In the grass the grasshoppers make their hiss, and towards evening the yellowhammers utter a few notes; but while the corn is being reaped the meadows are all but still.

Chapter Twelve.

The Ash Copse—The Nightingale—Cloud of Starlings—Hedgehogs—Heron’s Head—Moorhens—Among the Reeds.

A gap in the hedge by Hazel Corner leads through a fringe of hawthorn bushes into the ash copse. There is a gate at a little distance; but somehow it is always more pleasant to follow the bye-way of the gap, where two steps, one down into the ditch, or rather on to the heap of sand thrown out from a rabbit bury, and one up on the mound, carry you from the meadow—out of cultivation—into the pathless wood. The green sprays momentarily pushed aside close immediately behind, shutting out the vision, and with it the thought of civilisation. These boughs are the gates of another world. Under trees and leaves—it is so, too, sometimes even in an avenue—where the direct rays of the sun do not penetrate, there is ever a subdued light; it is not shadow, but a light toned with green.

In spring the ground here is hidden by a verdant growth, out of which presently the anemone lifts its chaste flower. Then the wild hyacinths hang their blue bells so thickly that, glancing between the poles, it is hazy with colour; and in the evening, if the level beams of the red sun can reach them, here and there a streak of imperial purple plays upon the azure. Woodbine coils round the tall straight poles, and wild hops, whose bloom emit a pleasant smell if crushed in the fingers. On the upper and clearer branches of the hawthorn the nightingale sings—more sweetly, I think, in the freshness of the spring morning than at night. Resting quietly on an ash-stole, with the scent of flowers, and the odour of green buds and leaves, a ray of sunlight yonder lighting up the lichen and the moss on the oak trunk, a gentle air stirring in the branches above, giving glimpses of fleecy clouds sailing in the ether, there comes into the mind a feeling of intense joy in the simple fact of living.

The nightingale shows no timidity while all is still, but sings on the bough in full sight, hardly three yards away, so that you can see the throat swell as the notes are poured forth—now in intricate trills, now a low sweet call, then a liquid ‘jug-jug-jug!’ To me it sounds richer in the morning—sunlight, flowers, and the rustle of green leaves seem the natural accompaniment; and the distant chorus of other birds affords a contrast and relief—an orchestra filling up the pauses and supporting the solo singer.

Passing deeper into the wood, it is well to be a little careful while stepping across the narrow watercourse that winds between the stoles. Rushes grow thickly by the side, and the slender stream seems to ooze rather than run, trickling slowly down to the brook in the meadow. But the earth is treacherous on its banks—formed of decayed branches, leaves, and vegetable matter, hidden under a thin covering of aquatic grasses. Listen! there is a faint rustling and a slight movement of the grass: it is a snake gliding away to its hole, with yellow-marked head lifted above the ground over which his dull green length is trailing. Stepping well over the moist earth, and reaching the firmer ground, there the thistles grow great and tall, many up to the shoulder; it is a little more open here, the stoles having been cut only two years ago, and they draw the thistles up.

Sometimes the young ash, shooting up after being cut, takes fantastic shapes instead of rising straight. The branch loses its roundness and flattens out to a width of three or four inches, curling round at the top like the conventional scroll ornament. These natural scrolls are occasionally hung up in farmhouses as curiosities. The woodmen jocularly say that the branch grew in the night, and so could not see its way. In some places (where the poles are full-grown) the upper branches rub against each other, causing a weird creaking in a gale. The trees as the wind rises find their voices, and the wood is full of strange tongues. From each green thing touched by its fingers the breeze draws a different note: the bennets on the hillside go ‘sish, sish;’ the oak in the copse roars and groans; in the firs there is a deep sighing; the aspen rustles. In winter the bare branches sing a shrill ‘sir-r-r.’

The elm, with its rough leaf, does not grow in the copse: it is a tree that prefers to stand clear on two sides at least. Oak and beech are here; on their lower branches a few brown leaves will linger all through the winter. Where a huge bough has been sawn from a crooked ill-grown oak a yellow bloated fungus has spread itself, and under it if you lift it with a stick, the woodlice are crowded in the rotting stump. The beech boughs seem to glide about, round and smooth, snake-like in their easy curves. The bark of the aspen, and of the large willow poles, looks as if cut with the point of a knife, the cut having widened and healed with a rough scar. On the trunk of the silver birch sometimes the outer bark peels and rolls up of itself. Seen from a distance, the leaves of this tree twinkle as the breeze bends the graceful hanging spray.

The pheasants, that wander away from the preserves and covers up under the hills far down in the meadows as the acorns ripen, roost at night here in the copse; and should a storm arise, after every flash of lightning gleaming over the downs the cocks among them crow. So, too, in the daytime, after every distant mutter of thunder the pheasant cocks crow in the preserves, and some declare they can see the flash, even though invisible to human eyes, at noonday.

Clustering cones hang from the firs, fringing the copse on one side—first green, and then a pale buff, and falling at last hard and brown to strew the earth beneath. In the thick foliage of this belt of firs the starlings love to roost. If you should be passing along any road—east, north, west, or south—a mile or two distant, as the sun is sinking and evening approaching, suddenly there will come a rushing sound in the air overhead: it is a flock of starlings flying in their determined manner straight for the distant copse. From every direction these flocks converge upon it: some large, some composed only of a dozen birds, but all with the same intent. If the country chances to be open, the hedges low, and the spectator on a rise so as to see over some distance, he may observe several such flights at the same time. Rooks, in returning to roost fly in long streams, starlings in numerous separate divisions. This is especially noticeable in summer, when the divisions are composed of fewer birds: in winter the starlings congregate in larger bodies.

It would appear that after the young birds are able to fly they flock together in parties by themselves, the old birds clubbing together also, but all meeting at night. The parties of young birds are easily distinguished by their lighter colour. This may not be an invariable rule (for the birds to range themselves according to age), but it is the case frequently. Viewed from a spot three or four fields away, the copse in the evening seems to be overhung by a long dark cloud like a bar of mist, while the sky is clear and no dew has yet risen. The resemblance to a cloud is so perfect that anyone—not thinking of such things—may for the time be deceived, and wonder why a cloud should descend and rest over that particular spot. Suddenly, the two ends of the extended black bar contract and the middle swoops down in the shape of an inverted cone, much resembling a waterspout, and in a few seconds the cloud pours itself into the trees. Another minute, and a black streak shoots upwards, spreads like smoke, parts in two, and wheels round back into the firs again.

On approaching it this apparent cloud is found to consist of thousands of starlings, the noise of whose calling to each other is indescribable—the country folk call it a ‘charm,’ meaning a noise made up of innumerable lesser sounds, each interfering with the other. The vastness of these flocks is hardly credible until seen; in winter the bare trees on which they alight become suddenly quite black. Once or twice in the summer starlings may be observed hawking to and fro high in the air, as if imitating the swallows in an awkward manner. Probably some favourite insect is then on the wing, and they resort to this unwonted method to capture it.

Beyond the fir trees the copse runs up into a corner, where hawthorn bushes, briar, and bramble succeed to the ash-stoles, and are in turn bordered by some width of furze and brake fern. When this fern is young and fresh the sunshine glistens on its glossy green fronds, but on coming nearer the sheen disappears. On a very hot sultry day towards the end of summer there is occasionally a peculiar snapping sound to be heard in the furze, as if some part of the plant, perhaps the seed, were bursting. The shocks of wheat, too, will crackle in the morning sun. This corner, well sheltered by furze and brake, is one of ‘sly Reynard’s’ favourite haunts. The stems of the furze, when they grow straight, are occasionally cut for walking-sticks. Wood-pigeons visit the copse frequently—in the spring there are several nests—and towards evening their hollow notes are repeated at intervals. Though without the slightest pretensions to a song, there is something soothing in their call, pleasantly suggestive of woodland glades and deep shady dells.

Just before the shooting season opens there is a remarkable absence of song from hedge and tree: even the chirp of the house-sparrow is seldom heard on the roof, where only recently it was loud and continuous. Most of the sparrows have, in fact, left the houses in flocks and resorted to the cornfields after the grain. In this silent season the robin, the wood-pigeon, and the greenfinch, seem the only birds whose notes are at all common: the pigeons call in the evening as they come to the copse, the greenfinches in a hushed kind of way talk to each other in the hedge, and the robin plaintively utters a few notes on the tree. It is not absolute silence indeed; but the difference is very noticeable. Through the ash-poles on one side of the copse distant glimpses may be obtained of gleaming water, where a creek of the shallow lake runs in towards it.

Bordering the furze a thick hawthorn hedge—a double mound—extends, so wide as to be itself almost another copse. In the ‘rowetty’ grass on the bank or in the hollow places, under fallen leaves and trailing ivy, the hedgehog hides during the day, so completely concealed that while the sun shines it is extremely difficult to find one without a dog.

A spaniel racing down the mound will pounce on the spot and scratch the hedgehog out in a moment; then, missing the dog, you presently hear a whining kind of bark—half rage, half pain—and know immediately what he is doing. He is trying to unroll the hedgehog, who, so soon as he felt the approach of the enemy, curled himself into a ball, with the sharp spines sticking out everywhere. The spaniel, snapping at the animal, runs these quills deep into his jowl; he draws back, snaps again, shakes his head, and then tries a third time, with bloodspots round his mouth. Every repulse embitters him—his semi-whine expresses intense annoyance, and if left alone there he would stay till covered with blood.

But the older dogs sometimes learn the trick: they then roll the hedgehog over with a paw, touching it gently, so as not to run the spines in, till the depression comes uppermost where the hedgehog has tucked his head inwards. This is the only vulnerable place, and with one desperate bite the dog thrusts his teeth in there, seizes the nose, and then has the hedgehog in his power. The young of the hedgehog are amusing little things, and try to roll themselves up in precisely the same manner; but they cannot close the aperture where they tuck their heads in so completely. Though invisible during the sunshine, hiding so carefully as to be rarely found, when the dew begins to gather thickly on the grass and the shades deepen they issue forth, and if you remain quite still show no fear at all. While waiting in a dry ditch I have often had a hedgehog come rustling slightly along the bottom till he reached my boot; then he would go up the ‘shore’ of the ditch out among the grass hunting for beetles and the creeping things which he likes most.

In some places they are numerous; one or two other meadows on the farm beside the home-field are favourite haunts of theirs, and five or six may be found out feeding within a short distance. When all is still they move rapidly through the grass—quite a run; much quicker than they appear capable of moving. The plough lads, if they find one, carry it to a pond, knowing that nothing but water will make it unroll voluntarily—no knocks or kicks; but the moment it touches the water it uncoils. Now and then a labourer will cook a hedgehog and eat it; some of them will eat a full-grown rook at any time they chance to shoot it, notwithstanding the bitter flavour of the bird, only taking out a part of the back. Those who have had some association with the gipsies or semi-gipsies seem most addicted to this kind of food.

In the opposite direction to the ash copse, and about half a mile north of Wick farmhouse, there rises above the oak and ash trees what looks like the topmast and yard of a ship lying at anchor or in dock, the hull hidden by the branches. It is the top of an immensely tall and gaunt fir tree, whose thin and perhaps dying boughs project almost at right angles. This landmark, visible over the level meadows for a considerable distance, stands in that little enclosed meadow which has once before been mentioned as one of the favourite resorts of birds and wild animals.

From the ash copse the travelling parties come down the highway hedge to the orchard: then, crossing the orchard and road, they enter another thick hedge, which continues in the same general direction; and finally, following it, arrive at this small green mead walled in by trees and mounds so broad as to resemble elongated copses. The mead itself may perhaps be two acres in extent, but it does not appear so much: the part visible on first glancing over the gateway can hardly exceed an acre. The rest is formed of nooks—deep indentations, so to say—not more than six or eight yards wide at the entrance, and running up to a point. Of these there are four or five—recesses in the massive walls of green.

These corners are caused by the mound following the curiously winding course of a brook which flows just without on the left side; and without on the right side, runs a second brook, whose direction is much straighter and current slower. These two meet at the top of the mead, and then, forming a junction, make a deep, swift stream, flowing beside a series of water-meadows—broad, level, and open, like a plain—which are irrigated from it. The mounds in the angle where the brooks join enclose a large space planted with osiers, and inside the hedges all round the mead there is a wide, deep ditch, always full of slowly moving water: so that the field is really surrounded by a double moat; and in one corner, in addition, there is a pond hidden by maple thickets from within, and intended for the use of cattle in the adjoining field. The nearest house is several meadows distant, and no footpath passes near, so that the spot is peculiarly quiet. These mounds, hedges, osier-bed, and brooks, occupy an area nearly or quite equal to the space where cattle can feed.

Upon the fir tree a heron perches frequently in the daytime, because from that great elevation he can command an extensive view and feels secure against attack. Whenever he visits the water-meadows, sailing thither from the shallow lake (one of whose creeks approaches the ash copse), he almost always rests here before descending to the field to take a good look round. The heron is a most suspicious bird: when he alights in the water-meadows here he stalks about in the very middle of the great field, far out of reach of the gun. If ever he ventures to the brook, it is not till after a careful survey from the fir tree, his tower of observation; and, when in the brook, his long neck is every now and then extended, that he may gaze above the banks.

By the gateway, reached by crossing a rude bridge for the waggons, wild hops festoon the thickets. Behind the maple bushes in the corner the water of the pond, overhung with willow, is dark—almost black in the depth of shadow. Out of it a narrow and swift current runs into that slow straight brook which bounds the right side of the meadow. Here in the long grass and rushes growing luxuriantly between the underwood lurk the moorhens, building their nests on bunches of rushes against the bank and almost level with the water. Though but barely hatched, and chips of shell clinging to their backs, the tiny fledglings swim at once if alarmed. When a little older they creep about on the miniature terraces formed along the banks by the constant running to and fro of water-rats, or stand on a broken branch bent down by its own weight into the water, yet still attached to the stem, puffing up their dark feathers like a black ball.

If all be quiet, the moorhens come out now and then into the meadow; and then, as they stand upright out of the water, the peculiar way in which their tails, white marked, are turned upwards is visible. The bill is of a fine colour—almost the ‘orange-tawny’ of the blackbird, set in thick red coral at its base. Under the shallow water at the mouth of the pond the marks of their feet on the mud may be traced: they run swiftly, and depend upon that speed and the skilful tricks they practise in diving—turning back and dodging under water like a hare in the fields—to escape from pursuit, rather than on their wings. Through the thick green flags they creep, and into the holes the water-rats have made, or behind and under the natural cavities in the stoles upon the bank. They beat the water with their wings when they rise, showering the spray on either side, for a short distance, and then, ascending on an inclined plane, fly heavily, but with some strength.

At night is their time of journeying, when they come down from the lake or return to it, uttering a weird cry in the darkened atmosphere. By day, as they swim to and fro in the flags and through the duckweed, shaded from the hot sun under willow and aspen, they call to each other, not unpleasantly, a note something like ‘croog,’ with a twirl of the ‘r.’ In summer they do not move far from the place they have chosen to breed in: in the frosts of winter they work their way up the brooks, or fly at night, but usually come back to the old spot. The dabchick, a slender bird, haunts the pond here too, diving even more quickly than the moorhen.

Nut-tree bushes grow along the bank of the brook on this side—the nuts are a smaller sort than usual; and beside the wet ditch within the mound and on the ‘shore,’ wherever the scythe has not reached, the meadow-sweet rears its pale flowers. At evening, if it be sultry, and on some days, especially before a thunderstorm, the whole mead is full of the fragrance of this plant, which lines the inside ditch almost everywhere. So heavy and powerful is its odour that the still motionless air between the thick hedges becomes oppressive, and it is a relief to issue forth into the open fields away from the perfume and the brooding heat. But by day it is pleasant to linger in the shadow and inhale its sweetness—if you are not nervous of snakes, for there is one here and there in the grass gliding away at the jar of the earth under your footstep. Warmth and moisture favour their increase, as on a larger scale in tropic lands; and parts of the mead are often under water when a freshet comes down the brooks so choked with flags that they cannot carry it away quickly.

The osier-bed in the angle where the brooks join is on slightly higher ground, for although the withy likes water at its roots it should not stand in it. Springing across the ditch, and entering among the tall slender wands, which, though they look so thick part aside easily, you may find on the mound behind the butt of an oak sawn just above the ground; and there, in the shade of the reeds, and with a cool breeze now and again coming along the course of the stream, it is delicious in the heat of summer to repose and listen to the murmur of the water.

The moorhens come down the current slowly, searching about among the flags; the reed warblers are busy in the hedge; at the mouth of his hole sits a water-rat rubbing his face between his paws; across the stream comes his mate, swimming slowly with one end of a long green sedge in her mouth, and the rest towed behind on the surface. They are the beavers of our streams—amusing, intelligent little creatures, utterly different in habits from the rat of the drain. Move but a hand, and instantly they fall rather than dive into the water, making a sound like ‘thock’ as they strike it; and then they run along the bottom, or seem to do so, as swiftly as on dry land. But in a few minutes out they come again, being at the same time extremely timid and as quickly reassured; so that if you remain perfectly still they will approach within a yard.

Where the two brooks meet a hollow willow tree hangs over the brown pool—brown with suspended sand and dead leaves slowly rotating under the surface—where the swirl of the meeting currents, one swift and shallow the other deeper and stronger, has scooped out a basin. A waving line upon the surface marks where the two streams shoulder each other and strive for mastery, and its curve, yielding now to this side now to that, responds to their varying volume and weight. While the under-currents sweep ever slowly round, whirling leaf and dead black soddened twigs over the hollow, the upper streams are forced together unwillingly by the narrowing shores, and throw themselves with a bubbling rush onwards. Through the brown water, from under the stooping willow whose age bows it feebly, there shine now and again silvery streaks deep down as the roach play to and fro. There, too, come the perch; they are waiting for the insects falling off the willows and the bushes, and for the food brought down by the streams.

‘Hush!’ it is the rustle of the reeds, their heads are swaying—a reddish brown now, later on in the year a delicate feathery white. Seen from beneath, their slender tips, as they gracefully sweep to and fro, seem to trace designs upon the blue dome of the sky. A whispering in the reeds and tall grasses: a faint murmuring of the waters: yonder, across the broad water-meadow, a yellow haze hiding the elms.

In the nooks and corners on the left side of the mead the hemlock rears its sickly-looking stem; the mound is broad and high, and thickly covered with grasses, for the most part dead and dry. These form a warm cover for the fox: there is usually one hiding somewhere here, the mead being so quiet. Where the ground is often flooded watercress has spread out into the grass, growing so profusely that now the water is low it might be mown by the scythe. And everywhere in their season, the beautiful forget-me-nots nestle on the shores among the flags, where the water, running slower at the edge, lingers to kiss their feet.

Once, some five-and-twenty years ago, a sportsman startled a great bird out of the spot where the streams join, and shot it, thinking it was a heron. But seeing that it was no common heron, he had it examined, and it was found to be a bittern, and as such was carefully preserved. It was the last visit of bitterns to the place; even then they were so rare as not to be recognised: now the progress of agriculture has entirely banished them.

Chapter Thirteen.

The Warren—Rabbit-Burrows—Ferrets—The Quarry—The Forest—Squirrels—Deer—Dying Rabbit—A Hawk.

Under the trunks of the great trees the hedges are usually thinner, and need repairing frequently; and so it happens that at the top of the home-field, besides the gap leading into the ash copse, there is another some distance away beneath a mighty oak. By climbing up the mound, and pushing through the brake fern which grows thickly between the bushes, entrance is speedily gained to the wide rolling stretch of open pasture called the Warren. The contrast with the small enclosed meadow just left is very striking. A fresh breeze comes up from the lake, which, though not seen in this particular spot, borders the plain-like field in one part.

The ground is not level; it undulates, now sinking into wide hollows, now rising in rounded ridges, and the turf (not mown but grazed) is elastic under the foot, almost like that of the downs in the distance. This rolling surface increases the sense of largeness—of width—because it is seldom possible to see the whole of the field at once. In the hollows the ridges conceal its real extent; on the ridges a corresponding rise yonder suggests another valley. The two rows of tall elms—some hundreds of yards apart—the scattered hawthorn bushes and solitary trees, groups of cattle in the shade, and sheep grazing by the far-away hedge, give the aspect of a wilder park, the more pleasant because of its wildness.

Near about the centre, where the land is most level, an unexpected slope goes down into a cuplike depression. This green crater may perhaps have been formed by digging for sand—so long ago that the turf has since grown over smoothly. Standing at the bottom the sides conceal all but the sky overhead. Some few dead leaves of last year, not yet decayed though bleached and brittle, lie here at rest from the winds that swept them over the plain. Silky balls of thistledown come irresolutely rolling over the edge, now this way now that: some rise and float across, some follow the surface and cling awhile to the bennets in the hollow. Pale blue harebells, drooping from their slender stems here and there, meditate with bowed heads, as if full of tender recollections.

Now, on hands and knees (the turf is dry and soft), creep up one side of the bowl-like hollow, where, the thistles make a parapet on the edge, and from behind it look out upon the ground all broken up into low humps, some covered with nettles, others plainly heaps of sand. It is the site of an immense rabbit-burrow, the relic of an old warren which once occupied half the field. The nettle-covered heaps mark old excavations; where the sand shows, there the miners have been recently at work. At the sound of approaching footsteps those inhabitants that had been abroad hastily rushed into their caves, but now (after waiting awhile, and forgetting that the adjacent hollow might hide the enemy) a dozen or more have come forth within easy gunshot. Though a few like this are always looking in and out all through the day, it is not till the approach of evening that they come out in any number.

This is a favourite spot from whence to get a shot at them, but the aim must be deadly, or the rabbit will escape though never so severely wounded. The holes are so numerous that he has never more than a yard to scramble, and as he goes down into the earth his own weight carries him on. If he can but live ten seconds after the lead strikes him, he will generally escape you. Watching patiently (without firing), after the twilight has deepened into night presently you are aware of a longer, larger creature than a rabbit stealing out, seeming to travel close to the earth: it is a badger. There are almost always a couple somewhere about the warren. Their residence is easily discovered because of the huge heap of sand thrown out from the rabbit-hole they have chosen; and it is this ease of discovery that has caused the diminution of their numbers by shot or spade.

The ground sounds hollow underneath the foot—perhaps half an acre is literally bored away under the surface; and you have to thread your way in and out a labyrinth of holes, the earth about some of them perceptibly yielding to your weight. There must be waggon-loads of the sand that has been thrown out. Beyond this central populous quarter suburbs of burrows extend in several directions, and there are detached settlements fifty and a hundred yards away. In ferreting this place the greatest care has to be taken that the ferret is lined with a long string, or so fed that he will not lie in; otherwise, if he is not picked up the moment he appears at the mouth of the hole, he will become so excited at the number of rabbits, and so thirsty for blood, that he will refuse to come forth.

To dig for him is hopeless in that catacomb of tunnels; there is nothing for it but to send a man day after day to watch, and if possible to seize him while passing along the upper ground from one bury to another. In time thirst will drive him to wander; there is no water near this dry, sandy, and rather elevated spot, and blood causes great thirst. Then he will roam across the open, and by-and-by reach the hedges, where in the ditch some water is sure to be found in winter, when ferreting is carried on. So that, if a ferret has been lost some time, it is better to look for him round the adjacent hedges than in the warren.

Long after leaving the bury it is as well to look to your footsteps, because of solitary rabbit-holes hidden by the grass growing up round and even over them. If the foot sinks unexpectedly into one of these, a sprained ankle or even a broken bone may result. Most holes have sand round the mouth, and may therefore be seen even in the dusk; but there are others also used which have no sand at the mouth, the grass growing at the very edge. Those that have sand have been excavated from without, from above; those that have not, have been opened from below. The rabbit has pushed his way up from an old bury, so that the sand he dug fell down behind him into the larger bole.

The same thing may be seen in banks, though then the holes worked from within are not so much concealed by grass. These holes are always very much smaller than the others, some so small that one might doubt how a rabbit could force his body through them. The reason why the other tunnels appear so much larger is because the rabbit has no means of ‘shoring’ up his excavation with planks and timbers, and no ‘cage’ with which to haul up the sand he has moved; so that he must make the mouth wider than is required for the passage of his body, in order to get the stuff out behind him. He can really creep through a much smaller aperture. At night especially, when walking near a bury situate in the open field, beware of putting your foot into one of these holes, which will cause an awkward fall if nothing worse. Some of the older holes, now almost deserted, are, too, so hidden by nettles and coarse grass as to be equally dangerous.

The hereditary attachment of wild animals for certain places is very noticeable at the warren. Though annually ferreted, shot at six months out of the twelve, and trapped—though weasels and foxes prey on the inhabitants—still they cling to the spot. They may be decimated by the end of January, but by September the burrows are as full as ever. Weasels and stoats of course come frequently, bent on murder, but often meet their own doom through over-greediness; for some one generally comes along with a gun once during the day, and if there be any commotion among the rabbits, waits till the weasel or stoat appears at the mouth of a hole, and sends a charge of shot at him. These animals get caught, too, in the gins, and altogether would do better to stay in the hedgerows.

The grass of this great pasture has a different appearance to that in the meadows which are mown for hay. It is closer and less uniformly green, because of the innumerable dead fibres. There are places which look almost white from the bennets which the cattle leave standing to die after the seeds have fallen, and shrink as their sap dries up. Somewhat earlier in the summer, bright yellow strips and patches, like squares of praying-carpet thrown down upon the sward, dotted the slopes: it was the bird’s-foot lotus growing so thickly as to overpower the grass. Mushrooms nestle here and there: those that grow in the open, far from hedge and tree, are small, and the gills of a more delicate salmon colour. Under the elms yonder a much larger variety may be found, which, though edible, are coarser.

Where a part of the lake comes up to the field is a long-disused quarry, whose precipices face the water like a cliff. Thin grasses have grown over the excavations below: the thistles and nettles have covered the heaps of rubbish thrown aside. The steep inaccessible walls of hardened sand are green with minute vegetation. Along the edge above runs a shallow red-brown band—it is the soil which nourishes the roots of the grasses of the field: beneath it comes small detached stones in sand; these fall out, loosened by the weather, and roll down the precipice. Then, still deeper, the sand hardens almost into stone, and finally comes the stone itself; but before the workmen could get out more than a thin layer they reached the level of the water in the lake, which came in on them, slowly forming pools.

These are now bordered by aquatic grasses, and from their depths every now and then the newts come up to the surface. In the sand precipices are small round holes worked out by the martins—there must be scores of them. Where narrow terraces afford access to four-footed creatures, the rabbits, too, have dug out larger caves; some of them rise upwards, and open on the field above, several yards from the edge of the cliff. The sheep sometimes climb up by these ledges; they are much more active than they appear to be, and give the impression that in their native state they must have rivalled the goats. The lambs play about in dangerous-looking places without injury: the only risk seems to be of their coming unexpectedly on the cliff from above; if they begin from below they are safe. A wood-pigeon may frequently be found in the quarry—sometimes in the pits, sometimes on the ledges high up—and the goldfinches visit it for the abundant thistledown.

Between the excavated hollow and the lake there is but a narrow bank of stone and sand overgrown with sward; and, reclining there, the eye travels over the broad expanse of water, almost level with it, as one might look along a gun-barrel. Yonder the roan cattle are in the water up to their knees; the light air ripples the surface, and the sunshine playing on the wavelets glistens so brilliantly that the eye can scarcely bear it; and the cattle ponder dreamily, standing in a flood of liquid gold.

A path running from Wick across the fields to the distant downs leads to the forest. It would be quite possible to pass by the edge without knowing that it was so near, for a few scattered trees on the hillside would hardly attract attention. Nothing marks where the trees cease: thin, wide apart, and irregularly placed, because planted by nature, they look but a group on the down. There is indeed a boundary, but it is at a distance and concealed: it is the trout stream in the hollow far below, winding along the narrow valley, and hidden by osier-beds and willow pollards.

Ascending the slope of the down towards the trees, the brown-tinted grass feels slippery under foot: this wiry grass always does feel so as autumn approaches. A succession of detached hawthorn bushes—like a hedge with great gaps—grow in a line up the rising ground. The dying vines of the bryony trail over them—one is showing its pale greenish white flowers, while the rest bear heavy bunches of berries. A last convolvulus, too, has a single pink-streaked bell, though the bough to which it holds is already partly bare of leaves. The touch of autumn is capricious, and passes over many trees to fix on one which stands out glowing with colour, while on the rest a dull green lingers. Near the summit a few bunches of the brake fern rise out of the grass; then the foremost trees are reached, beeches as yet but faintly tinted here and there. Their smooth irregularly round trunks are of no great height—both fern and trees at the edge seem stunted, perhaps because they have to bear the brunt and break the force of the western gales sweeping over the hills.

For the first two hundred yards the travelling is easy because of this very scantiness of the fern and underwood; but then there seems to rise up a thick wall of vegetation. To push a way through the ever-thickening bracken becomes more and more laborious; there is scarce a choice but to follow a winding narrow path, green with grass and moss and strewn with leaves, in and out and round the impenetrable thickets. Whither it leads—if, indeed anywhere—there is no sign. The precise sense of direction is quickly lost, and then glancing round and finding nothing but fern and bush and tree on every hand, it dawns upon the mind that this is really a forest—not a wood, where a few minutes either way will give you a glimpse of the outer light through the ash-poles.